


Quiet

by collectingnames



Series: Clayleb Week 2019 [5]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: ClayLeb Week 2019, Insomnia, M/M, Mild Angst, Sharing a Bed, clayleb - Freeform, i really ought to be asleep right now, romantic intamcy, someone PLEASE ask Caduceus about his time alone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-09
Updated: 2019-11-09
Packaged: 2021-01-26 01:49:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21366181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/collectingnames/pseuds/collectingnames
Summary: Caduceus lay in bed, Caleb with his back to him but with none of the easy rise and fall of sleep, or the mumbling that usually slipped out of him while he dreamt.  He was weirdly still, like he was trying to pretend he was asleep.  Caduceus propped himself up on one elbow, trying to read his face in the darkness.  Nothing, nothing he could make out in the pitch black.  Caleb turned further onto his side so that his face was half-pressed into the mattress.
Relationships: Caduceus Clay/Caleb Widogast
Series: Clayleb Week 2019 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1536146
Comments: 1
Kudos: 89





	Quiet

**Author's Note:**

> So I ended up going with a completely different plot than what I had put in my notes. See also, the return of Bad at Words Caleb.  
Very lightly edited tbh, also idk why I'm having trouble making these fics hit at least 1k. Regardless, very excited for class swap.

Caduceus lay in bed, Caleb with his back to him but with none of the easy rise and fall of sleep, or the mumbling that usually slipped out of him while he dreamt. He was weirdly still like he was trying to pretend he was asleep. Caduceus propped himself up on one elbow, trying to read his face in the darkness. Nothing, nothing he could make out in the pitch black. Caleb turned further onto his side so that his face was half-pressed into the mattress.

He laid back down and put an arm around Caleb’s waist, “Having trouble sleeping?”

Nothing.

“Chamomile is very relaxing, if that would help,” Caduceus tried again.

Caleb rolled back so that he was on his side again.

“Caleb, are you awake?” He spoke plainly into the darkness.

“Yes,” a weak sound that barely made its way out of his throat.

“How long have you been awake?”

Caleb chuckled with dark humor, “I was never asleep.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, I just can’t sleep is all,” he shifted into the arm around his waist, closer to the warmth radiating from Caduceus’s chest.

“You can talk to me,” Caduceus mumbled into his hair where they were pressed against each other.

“I know, it’s just,” he sighed, “it’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing if it’s keeping you up,” he wished he could see his face, just have a little more to go on than sleepy tones.

Caleb suddenly sat up and grabbed his coat off a chair, “I think I just need some fresh air. I’ll be back soon, don’t wait up on me.”

What? He scrambled to get his legs and tail untangled from the blankets and startled when he stepped on Frumpkin’s paw. The little fey dashed away from him and hissed before settling back into a comfortable curled up position. With a rushed ‘sorry’ he followed up the stairs towards the tower. Out of the corner of his eye, he could have sworn he saw one of the others stare as he rushed, clearly a little disheveled from sleep, after Caleb.

He pulled himself up through the trapdoor and into the tower garden, immediately struck by the faint warmth that glowed all around. No Caleb though. But he wouldn’t have left the house entirely, not in the middle of the, well, it was probably night. He had that crazy good internal clock, he would have said something if Caduceus had dragged them to bed at two in the afternoon by mistake. A sigh somewhere in the distance made his ear flick. Carefully, he made his way towards the source, on quiet feet, his fingers trailing along the bark of the giant tree as he came around it.

Caleb sat there with his back against the rough bark of the trunk, sleep half closing his eyes as he gazed up at the lights. He gingerly ran his hand through Caleb’s hair. Some small flicker of relief ran through him when he tilted his head to follow the touch. Silence hung over them for a few long moments, only the rustling of wind through the leaves surrounding them.

“I’m sorry. I think the darkness has been getting to me. I am grateful for being out of the Empire but there’s hardly ever any sun in Rohsona,” he rubbed at his temples in an attempt to ease the tension out of his neck and shoulders.

Well, that was something of a relief. “Yeah, I suppose it gets a little strange sometimes.”

“I keep expecting the sun to come up and it doesn’t but I still always know what time of day it is. I do not know, I guess it is just finally starting to crawl under my skin.

“If it’s the sunlight you miss maybe you should join me up here more often,” Caduceus noticed the long pause where he didn’t reply. “Are you sure that’s all?”

“I don’t know, nothing I can put into words anyway. There is more. I’m sure of it. But I, I am too tired to figure out how to say it,” there was a fine layer of frustration laced into his words.

“Maybe you don’t need words. Whatever it is, I’m sure it’ll feel a lot better if you can sleep,” he managed to get a relaxed sigh out of him as he started to gently scritch at his scalp.

He yawned, “If I could sleep, I would.”

“Scooch forward a little?” he shifted so that he sat between Caleb and the tree, started sectioning out his hair, it had finally grown out long enough to hold a decent braid, “Nothing more relaxing than someone touching your scalp.”

“If you say so,” the unexpected contact brought back a little of that tension but it steadily retreated.

“I have to say, this was one of the little things I missed before,” he said as he quickly put a tiny basic braid in and promptly ran his fingers through it to take it out and get started on something more fitting.

“How long were you-?”

“Too long.” He knew the rough estimate but dwelling on it didn’t help.

“How did you pass the time?”

“I had a job to do, I did it. Every day. Day in and day out until I met you lot,” he took the hair that fell into his eyes 

“Were you prepared? To never leave? Should no-one have come? Would you just have stayed until the corruption overtook the Grove?” 

He had to force his mouth to say it, “Yes.”

“Why? You were okay with that?” Caleb gave him as best a sidelong glance as best he could without ruining the braid he was working on.

“It was that or drive myself in all sorts of weird directions trying to find a way to do both, heal the grove and not leave,” he never brought this up, with anyone, not the kind of thing thinking about, what he would say anyway.

Caleb put his hand over Caduceus’s where it briefly came to rest on his shoulder, “If you do not stop I can guarantee you. I  _ will  _ fall asleep and you’ll be stuck here until someone comes upstairs and makes a racket. Or until morning. Either way, you are stuck.”

“Hmm, I don’t know, there are a lot worse places I’ve been stuck before,” he put a kiss to Caleb’s temple.

Caleb hesitated, “You can keep braiding it if you would like, though.”

Caduceus chuckled and wrapped his arms tight around Caleb’s waist, let his head rest on top of his shoulder. A quiet smile accompanied by a content hum reverberated in his chest. It took a bit of awkward shuffling but Caleb turned in his grip and brought the two of them a little closer together, leaning in with their foreheads touching. It was quiet again. A moment of peace and quiet, at this point the only sound the white noise of the wind through leaves.

In their sleepy daze, they made their way back to Caleb’s room, where Frumpkin had taken up residence on the pillows. He snapped his fingers twice, making him bamf out and then back again on top of a chair. There were more things he wanted to say, more things he wanted to ask, but with his limbs heavy with sleep he would be content with the quiet of the two of them curled up together.


End file.
